Safaga
Safaga
is a favourite spot for sun bathers, and its water is
known to have a high content of saline, which is said
to be beneficial for the skin. Encircled by Makadi Bay,
Soma Bay and Shahl Hashish - Safaga is also home to Tobia
Arbaa and Tobia Hamra; these two chain reefs line the
shore and make it an ideal spot for daily diving.The town
is also popular for windsurfing and, in 1993, hosted the
World Windsurfing Championships.
The
largest and best-preserved Roman site in the Eastern Desert,
Mons Claudianus, was once home to 1,000 quarrymen and
soldiers. Today, visitors can still see remnants of the
fortress, dwellings, workshops, stables, baths, broken
granite columns and slabs. One column is a staggering
16 metres long and 2.4 metres wide, weighing 209 tons.
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Most dive sites are still unspoilt and can be reached
by boat, less than one hour to the inner reefs and between
one-and-a-half to two hours to the outer reefs.
There is something there to match all interests: manta
rays at Sha’ab Saiman, the eel garden at Gamul Kabira,
blue-spotted stingrays at Tobias, sharp drop-offs at Abu
Kafan, the anemone city at Panorama Reef. And then there
is the night dive at Sha’ab Sheer or confronting
the huge Salem Express lying on its starboard side.
Safaga is also famed for Mons Claudianus. These fascinating
ruins of a Roman settlement lie in the desert between
the Red Sea and the Nile. For more than two centuries,
from 68 AD to 282 AD, Mons Claudianus used the surrounding
mountains to produce high quality columns and building
blocks of grey granite known as granodiorite for the sole
purpose of beautifying imperial Rome.
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